Esat Fusion lowers cost of Internet access

Esat Fusion has announced it is to cut its home Internet access rates by up to 20 per cent.

The company says the new rates will be made available immediately to the company's 150,000 residential telephone users.

To avail of the offer, customers will need to log on to the internet through the company's portals, iol.ie and oceanfree.net.

Esat says customers will now be able to access the Internet for four cent per minute during the day and one cent per minute at evenings and weekends.

Eircom, Esat's main rival in the internet service provision market, charges 1.27 cent for off-peak access and 5.08 cents for daytime use.

Chief executive Derek Kickham said the offer "will kick start a stagnant market which is good news for consumers, 98 per cent of whom pay for their internet access by the minute."